I see you guys got back to the subject im not interested in but anyway, wanted just to add this since it was already written , then you can continue discussing whether "mods should be sold or not".

Dinosawer wrote:
Surface Reflection, I kinda like that idea. Although there might be some practical problems (the most important being people having a somewhat optimistic idea about how good their mod is and thus Josh getting more mais than he can handle ), those could be solved.
Although I'm a proponent of the FOSS philosophy, there are sometimes huge conversion mods that really would warrant getting money (of off my head, think Skywind, OpenMW, that kind of stuff.) The really good and big ones, as you say.

Nice. Exactly, Skywind is also a good example, - if you had say five huge mods like that offered for some change it would be i think quite an attractive proposition for the fans.
Thats what i was saying.

Practical problems are of the sort that can be dealt with and solved i think. Precisely because we are talking about a very small number of such mods.
As i said, it doesnt need to be just Josh who evaluates these submissions, but he has the final say.

There is also a fact that not everyone will submit their super mod for this. Some people may decide to just do it in a usual way. Those that will be thinking about it will know that the mod will have to pass through quality control of some kind and therefore will work harder and solicit more feedback covering those angles.

DWMagus wrote:
Next, I actually like Surface Reflection's idea.

I originally came from the SCP forums (Freespace forums)

Man, those people sure deserve something for all that amazing work they did to bring one of my favorite games up to modern standards. Is that a decade of work right now, more?

Those are few and far between.

Indeed, even in the best of circumstances.

Specific logistics aside on the 'how to make it work', I think the idea is sound. It keeps the IP in Josh's hands, as well as the QA to prevent crap from being branded as 'official'. It also allows Josh to monetize what originally was his creation and acts as a way to 'license' the engine without explicitly doing so (hell, he could even toss in a small disclaimer that states those mods are a type of licensing). And last, it allows the content creators to be recognized and be rewarded for their work (something we all can agree should happen--recognition for a great piece of work is always good).

E - xactly.

Scytale wrote:- the actual point at hand i.e. SR's suggestion?

Thank you for trying to keep things on the straight and narrow. Appreciated.

my system would be to have some mods qualify for being paid and some mods not qualifying. I think that volunteers or modders who do it for a living themselves could tell if something qualified, and for how much. In the case of modders qualifying modders, though, they could only do so with other modders for obvious reasons. I don't know if this would work very well, but it seems like a good idea in theory.

Destruction is never precise, Creation is a thought, Time is an illusion, and Chaos and Order are one and the same.

Seryth Nortra wrote:my system would be to have some mods qualify for being paid and some mods not qualifying. I think that volunteers or modders who do it for a living themselves could tell if something qualified, and for how much. In the case of modders qualifying modders, though, they could only do so with other modders for obvious reasons. I don't know if this would work very well, but it seems like a good idea in theory.

Here's a good example. Black Mesa is a mod for Half Life 2. It is a complete (and I mean COMPLETE) remake of the original Half Life 1. New textures, graphics, animations, sounds, voice acting, etc. They worked on it completely free of charge for over 10 years. How do I know this? I have been following it that long. Ever since they announced that they would be making it. I think that was 2-3 websites ago. They did it part-time since they had lives, jobs, families, and other important things going on. But I think this developer's comment sums it up for a lot of them.

[BMS] DR!P
A++ Would spend 10 years of my life making again

After part 1 of the mod was completed and it was the first, if not one of the first mods greenlit by Valve, Valve started working with them on the mod. They went back through it, redid the graphics, voice acting, and animations a little bit more and re-released this mod for $19.99. If you wait a little while, a free version comes out that you don't have to pay a cent for (hence...free version). The free version gets just as much support as the one to pay for...but the one you pay for rewards the developers for their dedicated and AMAZING work. I think the fact that Valve worked with them like this is one of the main reasons I like Valve so much. They have high points, and low points (HALF LIFE 3!?!?!?) but I gladly paid 20 dollars at the time of release. Xen will be released in the near future hopefully

As for other mods, I don't know how well other companies work with them and this was a unique case imo. It was a nice story though.

"Everyone needs to have their avatar's edited to have afros." -Charley Deallus